This book is a collection of translations from Old Photos, a Chinese bimonthly publication launched in 1996 that presents photographs and narratives from ordinary readers and professional historians in a manner that proclaims: this is our history, not the history those above would have us believe. The magazine was concerned with the everyday lives of ordinary people while also covering the momentous, often traumatic, political life of the People’s Republic. It became clear it would also serve as a forum and archive for people’s experiences and reflections about life in the People’s Republic. Old Photos presented an open format where readers’ contributions were published alongside that of professional writers, historians’, and novelists.
